a3Genealogy - Accurate, Accessible Answers - specializes in military, naturalization records, Native American and African American ancestry. The a3Gen blog is penned by Kathleen Brandt, an international genealogy consultant, speaker and writer. a3Gen clients span from Europe, Asia and Africa to the Americas.

Monday, March 19, 2012

Many
family historians and genealogists have accessed HeritageQuest Online remotely
using their local library card. Most go directly to the census files and fail
to explore the U.S. Congressional Serial Set collection. If you haven’t tried HeritageQuest Online
yet, check with your local library to see if they have a subscription to this popular
Genealogy research tool.

In
addition to various Census Records, Heritage Quest Online offers digitized
books that are searchable by people, place or publication, PERSI, the
Periodical Source Index, digitized Freedman’s Bank records, Revolutionary War
collection and the US Serial Set.

Although
each hold great interest to the family researcher, let’s review the U.S. Congressional
Serial Set, digitized by LexisNexis and provided to the family researcher
online.

What is the US
Serial Set?

The
15th Congress, 1817 – 1819 under James Monroe, began the publication of the
United States Congressional Serial Set which contains House and Senate Document
and Senate Reports. The bound books of
the Serial Set were assigned a unique serial number,
thus the name. The collection includes Private Relief Actions, Memorials and
Petitions which have genealogical interests. These topics have been abstracted
and digitized on HeritageQuest Online (Proquest) and Readex of Newsbank databases for online
search queries. (Note: You will want to do a name and place search on both of
these abstracted collections, as they might offer different finds).

Prior
to 1817 the 1st – 14th US Congress (1789-1815)
activities, records and documents may be found amongst the 39 published volumes
of the American State Papers.

Genealogy Research

A
National Archives overview of the U.S. Congressional Serial Set, penned by
Jeffery Hartley in 2009, Using the Congressional Serial Setfor Genealogical
Research tells us that the reports and documents cover topics
on “women, African Americans, Native
Americans, students, soldiers, sailors, pensioners, landowners and inventors.” Luckily for us, both
HeritageQuest Online (ProQuest) and Readex of NewsBank have abstracted and
digitized text-searchable articles of genealogical interests and provided them
to us online.

HeritageQuest
Online (ProQuest) collection includes documents from 1789 to 1969. The Readex Collection includes the Congressional Serial Set of
1817-1994 (103rd Congress). As these reports may be private in
nature and mention your ancestor by name, or have a ruling or account of your
ancestor’s activities, the family researcher will surely want to scour the
collection using name, place and keyword searches.

What Will You
Find?

Bounty
land and other land claims may assist the genealogists in understanding why an
ancestor was granted or denied land. The private land claim records and
documents between 1789 to WWII are extensive; over 500,000 were brought before
congress during these years. Researchers may also find law suits that name
their ancestors. I often see soldier, widows, pensioners, named, especially for
the Civil War era, but there is a large collection of Revolutionary War reports
also, some detailed by the Daughters of the American Revolution. Private relief
petitions and claims offer historical information on our ancestor as well.

An
interesting find may be of a divorced woman in search for financial assistance.
Details of the divorce are often given. Another
great find may be locating your ancestor as a federal employee between
1883-1863. These records may provide residence, work assignment and pay. Army and Navy registers from 1848 to the
early 1860’s are also available and often include death information. Other findings may include land surveys,
western explorations and expansions and railroad papers and a plethora of
maps.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Perhaps you had stellar education and was taught this in school, but for
most this bit of early American history was left out of the curriculum.In
researching a family that settled in Georgia I came across a few
spectacular sources validating the need of passports in order to enter (or
cross through) Cherokee Nation, Creek Nation and Spanish Territories of the
southeast.

Need Passport for Travel Inside USA?

What is now the
southeastern states (those east of the Mississippi River to include Tennessee,
Kentucky, Georgia, Mississippi, Virginia, North and South Carolina) was under Spanish
jurisdiction or designated Indian territory. These jurisdictions required travelers
to possess Governor issued passports to enter the non-American owned
territories. The passport papers included character references and identified
the need to enter into Creek Confederacy of Georgia - Creek Nation (Muskogee),
Cherokee territory or Spanish territory. Your ancestral migratory path may be verified
with the aid of these papers.

From 1785 through 1820, individuals from Georgia
or traveling through Georgia from other states who desired to travel to or
through Indian Territory were required to obtain a passport from the Governor.

Although original
passports were issued to the travelers, you may find the recorded copy in the Executive
Department Minutes (Record Group 1-1-3).

Cherokee Treaty Passport Requirements

In 1791, the Cherokee
Treaty, Article 9 prevented entry into the Cherokee Nation without a Governor
generated passport. Cherokee Nation
required passports began as early as 1785-1820.

Passports
to traverse or enter these territories were not limited to your Georgia
ancestors. The following is a three page
set from South Carolina Governor declaring Captain John Hughbankworthy to enter the Creek Territory for
settlement. This multi-witnessed 1804 passport
sold at auction for $177.75 (http://www.hcaauctions.com/LotDetail.aspx?lotid=26936).

Spanish Territory
Passport Needs

All
of us have heard of Louis and Clark. But did you know in 1803 the St. Louis Spanish
commandant denied the explorers to enter the Louisiana Territory because they
did not have a Spanish passport?

Sunday, March 11, 2012

I thought I should document this story for it impresses upon us the importance of thorough research, and encourages us not to be hasty in our conclusions. I attempted to recall this story today in a seminar, and thought it best to record it accurately.

Will The Real WHC Stand?
As an early researcher I was led to Camp Butler cemetery by Civil War
records. So when the intials WHC
appeared on a tombstone at the gravesite I thought my questions were answered. Here among all the tombstones, we thought,
was the burial place of Wiley Harvey Charles (W.H.C.) But yet on the tombstone, it also states “unknown”.
What was unknown?

It was this clue that led a further search. Perhaps W.H.C. was not our Wiley. The best explanation thus far is WHC stood
for William Henry Chase Whiting (1824-1865). Whiting was captured at the Battle
of Fort Fisher with the rest of the Fort defenders and transferred to the
Officers Prisoner of War Camp: Governor’s Island, where he died of dysentery. Much
can be found at the United Daughters of the Confederacy website. Like many civil war vets his wife had
his body exhumed and reinterred. Whiting’s final resting place was at the Oakdale
Cemetery in Wilmington, NC.

Major General WHC Whiting was captured at Fort Fisher and
died at Governor’s Island, in New York March, 1865 (his obituary states). Many of his men were also captured or killed and
their tombstones gave tribute to their Confederate service to WHC’s army. The story of Whiting, William Henry Chase can be found at the Texas State Historical Society.

The Opposite of
Galvanized Yankees

Galvanized Yankees were prisoners of war who in exchange for
their freedom traded their gray uniforms for blue. But WHC Whiting left the Unites States Army
(West Point Grad), resigned from the Army Corps of Engineers, and picked up the
rebel flag in the Confederate States Army.

After a closer study of confederate tombstones, a repeat of WHC popped up everywhere: in cemeteries,
in civil war books, in birth records, etc. There’s Wiley Harvey Charles, also a
confederate soldier who went by WHC, and many who named their sons after WHC
followed by the family name. Just google
WHC +confederate or +civil war and be amazed at the number of people named WHC.

Another twist to this story is that the Fort Fisher captured
defenders who were not injured were imprisoned at Elmira (POW camp) in New York. And, the wounded captured Confederate
soldiers were taken to Point Lookout Maryland POW camp upon recovery. So why was this WHC tombstone at Camp Butler
in Illinois?

Well, maybe, I don’t have my ancestor’s exact tombstone
after all. What I have probably located is an unidentified soldier who served
under Whiting or (perhaps?) one of the unidentified soldiers captured with him
or killed on the battlefield.

For More Information
on Confederate Prisoners of War

For more information reference the National Archives
Publication M598: Selected Records of the War Department Relating to
Confederate Prisoners of War, 1861–1865; Department Collection of Confederate
Records, Record Group 109; National Archives, Washington, D.C. This collection has been digitized on
ancestry.com.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

WWII - Carrying the Troops
When all else fails, and you don’t have enough information in military records to clearly define with which unit or company your WWII ancestor served overseas, you may be able to follow ship records by dates to narrow possible troops/regiments.

Recently I came across a veteran’s Report of Separation (often referenced as a DD214) that provided three (3) crucial bits of data of European service. Along with other vital records and service data, practically every discharge report provides the following:
1)Date of Departure
2)Date of Arrival
3)Organization at time of discharge

WWII Service
Perhaps our men were busy fighting a war and some of the field notes became a bit cryptic while warding off attacks; records did not always clearly state every man’s move during engagement. Veteran’s service personnel files and separation reports do not yield a list of the various companies served while stationed in during war-time. Even Morning reports were inconclusive with movements, transfers, and temporary assignments For example, I have one report that states “9 total limited asgmt pers asgd &atchd unasgd this orgn this date.” Translation: 9 soldiers were unassigned from our organization and assigned to another. It’s possible those writing the reports had the same questions I had: “Which 9 men?” And, “to what other organization were they attached to?” This exact same note was on a Morning Report dated 3 Mar, 5 March and 25 March 1945 for the 394th, Co D. I can assumed these 9 men were classified as “replacements” Or was there so much movement, that names of the detached were less important than those responsible to the 394th Co. D “that day?” Maybe it was through these cryptic notes that the final number of men reporting to a troop were accounted for and tracked. (Note: rosters and muster rolls for 1944 to 1946 are not available; however, you may find a few tucked away in the Morning Reports.)

Ship Record Intentionally Destroyed 1951
According to National Archives correspondence, original ship records were intentionally destroyed in 1951. NARA as quoted on website World War II Ships:

According to our records, in 1951 the Department of the Army destroyed all passenger lists, manifests, logs of vessels and troop movement files of the United States Army Transports for World War II.

Separation papers, however, usually state departure data for “Service Outside Continental US…” With this information you may wish to include ship movements and histories in your research in order to trace your ancestor's troop movements during the war. Be sure to visit the World War II Ships website for a chronological listing of ship departure dates in 1943. (This is the best source I’ve seen so far for reconstructing the destroyed records.)

Once you have narrowed your troop by date of departure/arrival, then Morning Report searches of those candidates are necessary. No, it will not be easy and fast, but it may be possible to locate your soldier by name (hidden roster, medical attention, transfers, etc.) and even have a glimpse of daily activity in Europe through troop reports.

Issues/Conflict
Using ship/transport records as a tool of tracing a soldiers comes with a few warnings since following “replacements and the many wartime transfers” are not an easy tasks:

Your ancestor may have served with various companies, troops, and organizations throughout the war, with no mention by name or service number in Morning Reports.

Once soldiers reached overseas they may have been assigned to a new troop.